Highlights

Believe It Or Not, Gruff Rhys Can Actually Be A Pretty Ruff Ghy On Tour

Hey assholes, it's me! Gruff Rhys! Yeah, I'm wearing a striped shirt today -- what's all the fuss, fatty? You think you're so fucking tough, don't you, slammin' to the sounds of Kevin Drumm and, what, Runzelstirn & Gurgelstock? Yeah, you're a total bad-ass; you can go throw up into a bucket with all your friends, you little fairy. You want to see real strength? You want to see a one-man, a one-MAN show that'll blow your undies all the way up to your neck? You're lookin' at him. You're not even lookin' at him; you're just sorta glancin' in my general direction because you know my stare is as harsh as fuckin' ice-nine.

Welcome to your own personal hell, my friends, because I am planning 12 dates in North American cities, and you better call your mayors, because when I'm done with those cities, I am done with them, as in they will be no more, understand? I will be entering, let's say Brooklyn, voted the #3 place to raise a family in the United States, and I'll set up my acoustic guitar and lean into the mic, saying "This next one's off my latest album, Candylion, and I hope you like it," and before your little girlfriend can squeeze your hand in excitement and secret lust, I'll jump back on the mic and be like, "and if you don't," and then make that X motion over my package that they do in wrestling. I'm telling you, there's going to be riots in the street, in homes, after I slam my way through that song. Then I'll take a break for a sip of water and say something about how the next Super Furry Animals album is on its way August 27, and then I'll go into another song, but everyone will be like, "Wait, what's it called?" and I'll act like I can't hear them until they start chanting my name, and then I'll be like, "HEY VENUS!" and everyone will start cheering as some chick named Venus comes up on stage and we mack it, and I don't even have that strong of feelings for her.

And then I'll move on to the next city, trail of smoke wafting behind me. Yeah... they'll be pretty short sets.

It's time to get to the bottom of this business with Los Campesinos! But don't worry, the exclamation point is theirs, not mine -- I'm cool, calm, and collected about this! Toronto powerhouse label Arts & Crafts has taken this young band under its collective (get it?) wing, first with an opening slot for indie-rock behemoth Broken Social Scene and more recently by signing the burgeoning 7-piece to a record deal! Los Campesinos!, though, do not hail from the Great White North, nor do any of their members play in the Social Scene or Scene spawn, for that matter! This shakes my foundation and, to be frank, makes me feel unsettled! When I turn to A&C for my fix of the Canadian Grateful Dead (BSS), a venti-sized Starbucks blend of latte soaked goodness (like Feist) or orchestral chamber pop (like Stars), I want to know this is the most interwoven, interconnected, inbred group of musicians I can possibly find, all (or mostly) hailing from places where people care about hockey! Is that so much to ask?!

Instead, I'm getting a rambunctious hybrid of Arctic Monkey and Architecture in Helsinki that sounds like the band started by that kid who wouldn't stop wiping his nose on his sleeve in elementary school! They're from Cardiff, Wales, and I'm not even sure they play hockey in Wales! What's more, this band exponentially increases the deception factor by being neither Hispanic nor farmers! At this point, I wouldn't be able to take all of the abuse from a brand new band and an established label I once loved if this music wasn't so damn fun! And, for a few dates only, you can see it live!

It was always hot in August; Ohio was good for that. It was fair time here in ol' Champaign County, the time of year for 15 year olds to get drunk and hook up in the campers and barns. The year was 2006, and a friend and I decided to head down to the county fair, only to realize that, if we wanted to live happy lives, our existence in this shitty area needed to be short-lived. My friend was wearing a really happening green Yeah Yeah Yeahs t-shirt, and I was wearing a brown Clap Your Hands Say Yeah shirt with pink font. It was sexy, and I loved me some CYHSY at the time.

As we walked on the dirt, smelling the essence of pig shit and fair food, we were confronted by a number of random guys. Typically, these manly men would be sporting a Holister baseball cap, leather sandals, American Eagle shorts, a Hot Topic metal bracelet, and an Abercrombie shirt. They were being loud, obnoxious, and would typically "clap their hands" and shout "yeah!" while hangin' with their buddies.

One of the boys (the most obnoxious one) went by the name "George." George had no clue that Clap Your Hands Say was an amazing band that took the independent music world by storm with their self-released, self-titled debut album back in 2005. So what did George do? You guessed it. He "clapped his hands" and said "yeah."

The next day the police department found George on top of a camper, rotting and chewing on his castrated nuts.

Moral of the story: If you don't want to end up like George, I suggest you get some schooling and see CYHSY live at these dates:

Halfway through an oh-so-lonely spin of La-La-La Lohan’s “Rumors” this fourth of July, Janet Reno got sick of her post-cold cream bedtime routine: singing into her hairbrush and getting down to JAMZ behind closed doors, where only she could appreciate her smooth, supple breasts sagging on her robust figure, her chick-with-a-mission hairdo, and her tasteful cotton panties.

Long since holding onto a dream that looks don’t matter to her MAJAHH CRUSHHHH!, a friend of a friend told Janet that America, who she had long since been putting the moves on, digs that FUGLY SLUT Pam Anderson. And Angelina Jolie. And Jennifer Aniston.

WHAAAAAAT????? AMERICA LIKES HOT CHICKS????? WHAT ABOUT BRAINS????

“AMERICA IS JUST NOT THAT INTO YOU, JANET,” said the friend.

Janet was heartbroken.

After deciding a boob job would jerk the chain of that whole female-empowerment thing she has going for her, she changed into her pajamas (a shoulder-padded feet pajamas business suit of breathable fabric) and remembered youth (acne, headgear, never getting asked to a prom), and at that moment got WAY EMPOWERED. Following a road paved by every ugly girl who pretends it doesn’t bother them to look like ass, Reno flipped through Cosmo for tips on tightening her abs and cried halfway through sit-up number three.

“I’m sick of being alone!” said Reno, sniffling, while her hairline sweat profusely.

Though sit-ups weren’t happening, neither was sitting at home in her pajamas.

Reno was going out tonight.

After caking on some glitter-ific Caboodles, hoisting her ever-saggy boobs into a killer halter top, and slumping her lady-lump into rhinestone-decaled jeans, she decided in order to declare her orgasmic mack-mackin’ love o’ America, she would stop at nothing -- even if it came to a good, dirty mud wrestle with Pam Anderson.

So, rather than locking her door and sitting under the sheets with smutty issues of TIME, Newsweek and Life, she rolled out to DA’ CLUBZ, did some body shots wit’ DA’ BOYZ, made out with a few chicks (...for attention... yeah, attention...), and awoke next morning on a street corner, naked and alone.

Her hair smelled of vomit.

Vowing never to shake her most generously-endowed groove thing again, Reno resigned herself to the I’ll-love-you-from-afar existence of the intellectual elite, resulting in this subtle mix CD. A tribute to a love she’ll never have.

Reno took two years to compile this American tribute mix, a 3CD, 50-song compilation, to be released September 18 (Three Tigers), including tracks from Andrew Bird, Danielson, Devendra Banhart, and John Mellencamp. Seriously.

Bigger Boobs=Happiness, I Wanted This Land To Be My Land, You Are Beautiful In Every Single Way, America:

Hey Venus!, Super Furry Animals’ eighth proper studio album, will be released August 27 via Rough Trade. The “Show Your Hand” single will be out a fortnight earlier, on August 13. Here is the trackli--.... wait, hold on a sec... is one of the songs below seriously called “Baby Ate My Eight Ball”? Surely the best song title ever! You can have your “Every Time I Eat Vegetables It Makes Me Think of You,” your “Russian Berries but You’re Quiet Tonight,” your “Mama Get the Hammer (There’s a Fly on Papa’s Head),” and the entire Fall catalogue, but “Baby Ate My Eight Ball” is better. Given these Welsh eccentrics penchant for perfect pop, folk, psych, and even cod-techno, it will most likely be the best sounding song ever too, until the next one at least.

Team SFA will be playing shows this summer, most likely with its unique surround sound system in tow, but probably not with its blue and pink tank along for the ride; maybe with a continent of stage dancing fuzzy yetis and definitely packing a back catalogue that reeks of consistency and class and that puts most drippy, flat band outputs to shame. Tourdates:07.13.07 - Kent, England - Lounge on the Farm07.14.07 - Coventry, England - Godiva Festival07.21.07 - London, England/Dublin, Ireland - Lovebox Festival08.25.07 - Cardiff, Wales - Cooper’s Field, Get Loaded in the Park08.31.07 - Glasgow, Scotland - Connect Festival09.02.07 - Jersey, England - Jersey Live09.15.07 - Derbyshire, England - End of the Road Festival11.23.07 - Burnham-on-Sea, England - Tunnel Vision Festival

Wales is very infrequently referred to as “the Jamaica of the British Isles.” That's all about to change, because Guto Pryce, dub loving bassist with Welsh national treasures Super Furry Animals, is the latest to have the honor of handpicking tracks from the Trojan Records vaults for release as Furry Selection. “Jamaican music looks forward, dub is ageless because it sounds like nothing else,” says Pryce. “The music that came from Jamaica in the late 60’s and early 70’s is some of the best I’ve ever heard, from anywhere in the world. You can’t believe how lucky I feel to plough through Trojan’s huge catalogue and choose my favourite tracks.” And we are lucky too, because we get to hear yet another musician’s take on the Trojan legacy, and that is never a bad thing. Furry Selection: Luxury Cuts of Trojan by a Super Furry Animal is out now. Here is what Guto chose:

I never really bought into that whole U.S. Empire business. Sure, its clear that the United States has always wanted to be an empire, but it was just too lazy to get off its saturated fat ass to actually make it happen. How can a country with a military budget of $439,000,000,000.00 lose a war to Korea, Vietnam, Iraq, and Afghanistan? That's the worst empire I've ever heard of.

India, on the other hand, they've got a shot. They've got the numbers, soon they'll have the cash, and they already got the bomb. The earliest signs are already emerging -– okay, it's not the earliest sign, but I think it's important -– as the tech-savvy Indians become the first country in the world to have digital music sales outreach the old-fashioned physical purchases. Not only has the Indian population embraced digital music far more readily than us North Americans, they are also way beyond us in the technology they use to get it. While you're waiting 30 minutes on a DSL line to grab the new Shellac, they're waiting seconds to have it transferred directly to their cell phones.

So, ask your grandma about the finer techniques of the duck 'n' roll, and get ready to use it. The Indians are a force to be reckoned with, and if we look at their ability to embrace technology compared to ours, we're in trouble. The nukes could be homed in on Washington as we speak. Oh but wait... they wouldn't do that, we're the only assholes prepared to blow up the earth –- or space, if Putin will ease up after his and Bush's fishing trip -– for no apparent reason. They'll just pull the old colonial switcheroo, as the American music industry becomes the salt mines of the Indian Raj, and we all cower in the face of the new India-Nokian Empire.